Section III

Awakening Your Other Senses (Step One)

You may think you have ESP already. Perhaps you’ve dreamed of the future once or twice, or had some other small flashes of insight. Or, on the other hand, you may think you have no ESP at all — you’re not the least bit clairvoyant as far as anyone can tell. Both views share the same misconception: ESP is just an interesting-but-fleeting occurrence. Actually, this is far from true… it’s a life-changing ability.

Proper meditation

Magic happens in a unique state of consciousness called “gnosis,” in which ESP is as effortless as chewing gum. Gnosis is the absence of any thought other than a vague impression that you exist. It may sound mysterious, but in truth it’s quite simple. This state of mind happens to you every time you wake up slowly from a dreamless sleep; you have no consciousness, then you realize that you’re alive, you exist, somewhere — then you eventually become aware of where you are and what plans you have for the rest of the day.

Gnosis can be achieved through several means. Some occultists prefer to use pain as a method to clear their minds – when you are in pain, you cannot easily think of anything else. Another method is to reach a state of excitement by dancing wildly, or spinning, or shouting. But the easiest and safest method I have found of reaching gnosis (and the only method I would recommend) is through meditation. Do not despair — meditation is not the lotus-position quack science you might imagine it to be. Meditation is merely waiting in a comfortable position for your mind to clear. (But not too comfortable — you don’t want to fall asleep!)

How do you meditate? As a computer programmer once eloquently put it, “Shut down all your processes until all that’s left running is the kernel.” Simply get comfortable and take several deep breaths to calm down. A common method is to mentally count 1, 2, 3, 4 as you inhale deeply; then 1, 2, 3, 4 as you hold the breath; then 1, 2, 3, 4 as you exhale all the air; and finally, 1, 2, 3, 4 before you start over again. Watch patiently as your body slows its processes. Observe, but do not participate, in the trickle of thought that eventually blacks out into nothing — but stay awake. Some like to mentally chant a mantra in order to keep from falling asleep; the trick, however, is to not get too involved in it. When your mind is a clean slate, you’re in gnosis and ready for the next step (which is usually a spell).

I must emphasize here: meditation does not involve thinking. Your mind must be completely clear before you can exercise your magical Will. Now, you may consciously try to reach this state, but that’s useless — you’ll be thinking about not thinking. This is an uphill battle. Instead, do nothing but watch and wait. Do this long enough, and you will notice yourself drastically shifting into deeper and deeper states of consciousness.

Don’t despair if you have trouble clearing your mind. Don’t fight a flow of thought, but rather let it play itself out until it is exhausted. If any new thoughts fight for your attention, realize that they’re not important. What’s more important is watching and waiting. With practice, your mind will accept stillness over turbulence.

Remember, the more patience you exercise in each stage of meditation, the deeper your state of gnosis will be. The perfect state of gnosis has been described in Eastern philosophies for centuries — as feeling like a “single point of consciousness suspended in infinity.” Beyond this there are evolutionary stages of yoga, which you can learn more about by reading Crowley’s Book 4. Most of us will never reach the stage of discipline it takes to experience this, but that’s fine as far as general metaphysics goes. Some spells, such as simple “vibration,” require very little gnosis to pull off.

IMPORTANT:
There is a fine line between New Age meditation and occult meditation. New Age books will train you to sit comfortably and clear your mind — which is correct as far as occultists are concerned. But then they’ll guide you through “visualizations” in which you imagine “white light surrounding you” and such. This can be correct, but the distinction must be drawn — if you have to try to imagine it, it’s not metaphysically real. This is also the case with chakras.

Chakras

A chakra is a psychic energy center of the body. These are your connections to the astral plane of reality. Just as your ears can hear physical noises, the chakras are your sensory organs for astral feelings (such as the “white light” you might experience in certain situations). Once you learn how to pay attention to them, you can interpret what they tell you — and you can put them to your use. Repeated use of the chakras will awaken siddhis, or powers, such as you will experience in Section V.

There are seven major chakras, pictured in the diagram to the right. However, since this course is only a short summary, and the full implications of the chakras cannot be explained in this limited space, we’ll only explore the four most important to this course.

If you were to draw an equilateral triangle between your eyebrows, the section of your brain two inches behind the top point would be the ajna chakra (see #2 in the chart to the right) — also known as your “Third Eye.”

New Age texts, again, make references to the third eye seem worthlessly cliche. If you’re daydreaming, they say, you’re seeing with your third eye — and this is most certainly not the case. The third eye is a remarkable organ, which occultists claim is capable of fully seeing the room you’re in even while the other two eyes are closed. This can easily be mistaken as imagination, but the example cannot be made as strongly enough as in Roald Dahl’s “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar” — in which an Indian fakir has his head enclosed in a plaster cast and then rides down a busy street on a bicycle. Kids, don’t try this at home!

If you’ve attuned yourself to using it, the third eye will become active when you need it — for example, clearly seeing a ghost if one is in the room. Again, there is no effort needed to invoke this skill; it happens automatically. The exercises at the end of this chapter are intended to “wake up” this dormant siddhi.

The second chakra you should know about is the manipura (see #5 in the chart), or “seat of the soul.” This is placed halfway between your front and back, approximately two inches above your navel; this area is also called your solar plexus. This is important to know for “centering,” which we shall explore later.

The third chakra is the muladhara (see #7 in the chart), or “root” chakra. This is at the base of your spine, at the coccyx. This is important to know for “grounding,” which we shall also explore later.

The fourth chakra lies at the top of your skull, directly above the spinal vertebrae in your neck. This is a point known as the Saharara (see #1 in the chart), or “Crown” chakra. This is extremely easy to find when you learn through experience how to apply pressure. You’ll be using this chakra for “charging up,” which, again, will be explained later.

Section III Exercises

1. Reach gnosis. You’ll know if you’ve reached it when you no longer remember who you are, the room around you seems like boundless space, and you’ve experienced a sort of slip into a deeper mindset (that last one is hard to explain… you’ll know it when it happens). To truly awaken your senses, you’ll have to do this at least once a day. A good quiet time to set aside for it is shortly before bed. Half an hour is usually sufficient.
2. If you tire of watching and waiting, or better yet, after reaching gnosis: Concentrate on your third eye. You know the general area it’s in, so just focus on that while you watch and wait. Make sure to remain relaxed and not to wrinkle your forehead — you want any feelings you experience to be metaphysical, not physical. After a bit of practice (again, one session a day is minimal) you should be able to feel pressure there. Try to make the pressure stronger….
3. If you can make the pressure so strong that it “pops” — or, strangely enough, feels like a flower blooming — then start reading up on kundalini, because you’ve got some real potential in that field.
4. Once you get to know your chakras, play with them. Get them to breathe, get them to glow, make them feel like they’re on fire or encased in ice. Try feeling-out the cone of energy connecting your third eye to the center of your brain, the pineal gland. That’s called Pete Sanders’ “joy touch,” which can also be used with the crown chakra and pineal gland.

While these exercises don’t sound very exciting, they are quite important. This disciplines the mind and weakens the barrier between the two worlds. You have very little chance of completing the next chapter without this training.

Witchcraft from the Ground Up navigation
Preface | Section One | Section Two | Section Three | Section Four | Section Five | Section Six | Section Seven | Section Eight | Section Nine | Section Ten | Section Eleven | Section Twelve | Section Thirteen